The Food Network featured several quick-service restaurants in two episodes of the Unwrapped series Monday night.
During the Fool-Good Foods episode, the show focused on Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen's secret spice blend and its special frying technique. The blend includes onion, garlic, spices and capsaicin hot chili peppers. The chicken pieces are tumbled in the spice mixture, then marinated for at least 12 hours.
Marshall Scarborough of Popeyes also demonstrated the making of the brand's Big Easy Chicken Bowl, which features layers of pulled chicken mixed in Cajun-style gravy, red beans and seasoned rice, all topped with sour cream, shredded cheese and Louisiana Hot Sauce.
The chain goes through 12 million pounds of flour each year to batter its chicken. Also used in a year: 5 million pounds of rice and 20 million pounds of red beans. Its restaurants sell 30 million biscuits annually as well.
Although not the focus of the segment, the location where the episode was filmed gives a good look at the chain's new prototype and logo.
In the Fast Food episode, Unwrapped looked at some of the history and operational procedures behind Taco Bell, Carl's Jr., Bamn! and Squeeze. The Taco Bell segment shared the history of how the chain was started by the late Glen Bell. His first restaurant was a hamburger stand, which featured a special recipe for hot chili dog sauce — now served as Taco Bell's taco sauce.
Taco Bell serves 2 billion tacos each year, each of which can be assembled in as fast as seven seconds. The chain's goal is to serve each customer, from time of order to delivery, in under three minutes.
The segment on Carl's Jr. featured Andrew Puzder, CEO of parent company CKE Restaurants, telling the history of the brand. Founded by the late Carl Karcher, the chain evolved from a hot dog stand to a drive-in to the smaller Carl's Jr. store. The chain now sells 500,000 burgers a day.
Viewers were able to see a Carl's Jr. Star Burger assembled, with toppings placed on the bottom in order to maintain freshness. A brief interview with the chain's product development staff discussed the brand's successful limited-time-only flavors, including guacamole sauce. Some flavors never made it out of the taste kitchen, including peanut butter and potato chips.
Also featured was New York-based coin-operated automat Bamn! The restaurant cooks food fresh continuously, placing each menu item in a temperature controlled box. The boxes are seen by customers as two walls of vending windows. Patrons drop in their coins for the selected menu item, and open the door to remove their food.
The menu features deep-fried macaroni and cheese known as Mac & Cheese Krokets, burgers, green tea soft serve, Hawaiian-shaved ice and more.
Finally, the episode took a look at smoothie chain Squeeze. The 7-year-old chain serves smoothies and yogurt made with fresh fruit and fresh-squeezed fruit juice.
